


Sick Day

by cognomen



Category: due South
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-26
Updated: 2009-12-26
Packaged: 2017-10-05 07:22:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/39190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cognomen/pseuds/cognomen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ray develops a temperature during a stakeout. Becomes Delirious.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sick Day

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, I loved revisiting this show and these guys. I think I'll eventually end up writing more, because this was a total blast to write.

  
  
  
**Entry tags:** |  [cog_nomen](http://community.livejournal.com/springkink/tag/cog_nomen)  
---|---  
  
_ **Due South (Ray#2/Fraser)** _

Title: Sick Day  
Author: cog_nomen  
Fandom: Due South  
Pairing: Ray#2/Fraser  
Rating: NC-17  
Warnings: M/M,   
Prompt: Ray Kowalski/Benton Fraser - H/C, Ray develops a temperature during a stakeout. Becomes Delirious.   
Word Count: 2365  
Author's Note: Wow, I loved revisiting this show and these guys. I think I'll eventually end up writing more, because this was a total blast to write.

 

He caught Fraser with a used tissue halfway to his mouth, and only just managed to stop him from tasting it by kicking up a big enough fuss in a demanding enough tone that the Mountie had to stop and answer - politely.

"Augh - Benny, don't - what - stop that! Stop, what are you doing?"

"I was about to check for signs of a sinus infection, Ray."

"By _licking_ it?"

"A sinus infection can be a serious problem." The tissue started upwards again.

"Don't. Don't - Benny!" It paused, inches from it's destination. "Look, I don't have a sinus infection. I had one when I was twelve - all I could smell was wet dog for a month."

Fraser arched one eyebrow inquisitively.

"This isn't like that." Kowalski made a big show out of sniffling, like he was trying to smell any distant hint of the aforementioned scent. All he succeeded in was swallowing a disturbing amount of mucus. "Nothing." Ray explained further - sometimes you had to spell things out for Fraser. Especially when it came to convincing him not to put things in his mouth.

"It's just a cold, Benny. Don't worry." Ray made a vague guesture, one wrist flopping bonelessly, a hand following the motion across his checked blanket. Benton looked concerned a moment longer, then gave a little affirmative nod and rose from his haunches. Ray didn't retreat back into sleep until he saw Benny drop the tissue in the garbage. He'd just have to have faith that it was safely out of the constable's mouth.

-

If it was possible, he felt _worse_ when he next came to. There was a terrible smell - by the low humming coming from across the cabin, Fraser was in the kitchen. The blanket was on the floor, and his consciousness muzzily returned. His limbs registered a messy tangle, fingers tingling with lost bloodflow. He took a long minute to sort himself out, his shoulder sore from it's previous unnatural position, trapped between his body and the couch.

It had all gone wrong - not that this was the end of the world or anything - when the guy they were staking out had almost run into them while they were in the act of applying listening devices around the guy's windows. On the upside, they were on a lake and therefore had someplace to dive into and practice the fine art of Fraser's so-called _buddy breathing_ system.

On the downside, it was not the sort of lake that one wanted to take a swim in. In fact, the directory of parks and services strongly advised against it, or eating any fish one could catch in the lake, and especially not _drinking_ the water without boiling it first. Fraser hadn't gotten sick, but then again, he never did. Maybe growing up in a barren arctic wasteland encouraged an especially strong immune system, who knew?

"Benny." He croaked, when he could wrestle his thoughts down to the one constant that had woken him up. "I'm thirsty." Parched. Cracked. Desert-dry, in fact. A frowning face peered out from the half-wall that sectioned off the kitchen from the rest of the cabin. Fraser ducked back in, then returned with a glass of water - iced, even. It seemed even chillier than Ray expected when he took it, and the coldness made his teeth ache as he drank it. He could only manage half the glass, before it's very proximity caused a shiver to crawl his spine. "Too cold."

A confused look crossed the mountie's face as he accepted the glass back. Fraser took a sip himself - Ray would have kicked up a fuss about germs and possibly spreading whatever form of horrible plague he had to Benny if he hadn't previously been witness to the man's incredible immune system. He was pretty sure that it could take on a polar bear all by it's lonesome. Then a hand - freezing cold from touching the glass - pressed to Ray's forehead.

"Oh dear." The tone conveyed the same soft dismay that Fraser used for most any situation - from absolutely dire to 'oh dear, Dief just piddled in the mayor's prize roses'.

"What? What 'oh dear'?" The cold fingers on his forehead refused to move, or warm up. "You think I have a fever? Benny, it's just a little cold." The fuss and attention felt somewhat awkward - Ray never really cared to be the one getting fussed over. Stella fussed, too, but she'd always bring it up afterwards - make him feel guilty.

"You are running a fever, Ray." Fraser answered matter-of-factly.

"Don't worry about it." Ray reassured, and Fraser stood up to head back into the kitchen. "What are you cooking?" It hurt a little to raise his voice - his throat was dry, and he had a headache that by his best estimate would have knocked out a horse.

"Chicken noodle soup." That sounded normal enough. "With moose." That didn't.

It was curious how Fraser could not only get moose anywhere - even in the relatively moose-free areas of the country. Curiouser still how he thought that it's addition to any meal would somehow enhance it. Usually, Ray would care more - maybe even argue. But at this moment in time, his energy to do so was flagging. In fact - another nap would be wonderful. Ray surrendered to sleep again.

-  
It wasn't quite freezing cold. It was close though, and Ray could feel goosebumps threatening. Also, it was wet. It took him a moment, blinking muzzily into a questionable state of consciousness. His glasses were off, but the most immediate things weren't fuzzy - a short white plastic wall, a small frothy lake, metal fixtures. Oh. The bathtub.

His own knees poked out of the water, bare, though where his hands rested on his stomach they covered partly the elasticized waistband of his boxers. That wasn't the strange thing - instead, he squinted at the second pair of knees, these encased in the dark blue of damp jeans.

He was leaning against something steady and firm and breathing. Fraser.

"You were quite insistant." Benny explained. "You used your no-nonsense voice, and I find it's better not to argue with you when you take that tone."

"Fraser, why are my boxers still on?" Ray's neck was starting to hurt a little from craning over his shoulder. "And why's the water cold?"

"The water is actually several degrees warmer than what I usually bathe in, Ray." Fraser addressed the less awkward question first. Ray considered the evasion - part of the mountie's character. His awkward nature around women extended to everyone he liked - he was shy. It was part of why Ray was so in love with the guy. His eccentricities were easy to excuse in that light.

"Benny, just because you're not only the president but also a member of the Polar Bear Club doesn't mean I wanna be too."

"...Ray, the water is thirty eight degrees celsius."

"How can you tell that? I mean, they teach you to be a walking thermometer in mountie school?" When Benton drew breath to answer, Ray raised his hand sharply, though the motion not only splashed water everywhere, but also made him feel a little woozy. "Don't answer that, I really don't wanna know."

"You're cold because of your fever." Benny explained, his tone low and quiet and rumbling worriedly through his chest into Ray's back. He shivered. It had little to do with the cold.

"Okay, but the boxers - you're still wearing your clothes?" Ray prompted - and Benny sank into uncomfortable silence. It was so typically Benny that Ray couldn't help but laugh. He sat up a little, sloshing the water, and shimmied out of his boxers - which he dropped in a sopping heap onto the bathroom floor. He was slowly starting to feel better - maybe the water really wasn't all that cold.

"You were hallucinating." Fraser informed as he shrugged off his half-wet tee shirt. It peeled off and smacked limply to the floor. He hesitated at the fastenings of his jeans - mostly since Ray was still staring at him. He met Ray's eyes uncertainly. "About Stella, I think."

Ray sighed, reaching up to scrub his hand through his wet hair. "Yeah." He admitted - the dreams were hazy, but he remembered a little. She would minister gently to him, once upon a time when he was sick. He often had scrapes or cuts - you know, the usual cop stuff. One time, he'd been positively mauled by a cat that he was trying to rescue from a tree. Then they'd grown further and further apart - he'd fallen more in love with his job than her, he had to admit. There was satisfaction in doing something right for someone, at the end of the day coming home after doing something that really mattered. Stella couldn't handle that - couldn't understand the driving, reckless want to go headlong into danger for the safety of perfect strangers.

Benny could.

"Do you miss her?" He asked, standing up with a sloshing of water around the tub's confines. He looked directly at Ray, unbuttoning his pants but maintaining eye contact. The expression - it's trying to be guarded and calm and neutral, but it fails. Benny looks worried and hurt and anxious, because even his features can't lie - not about something like this.

"I used to." The admission surprises even Ray - Stella was like an open wound in his life. The sort of deep cut she would minister to and cluck her tongue over and warn him to go to the hospital for, the sort that would need stitches. Only eventually she gave up on all that - got sick of it, worried herself sick and then got sick of worrying. A little light goes out in Benny's eyes - maybe the reflection from the bare bulb in the fixture on the ceiling disappears when he angles his head down.

"I've got someone better now." Ray gets up - it should be hard. He does still feel a little woozy, but this is too important to ignore for being a little sick. Stella would have fussed and guilted him for pushing himself. Fraser knew he did it because this was something that mattered more than that. He leans in, pushes bare chests together - it's familiar, it's old. They've done this many times - but maybe they hurried a little too much before. This time, there's no desperation in the beginning - quiet reassurance. Mending wounds.

"Benny." It captures Fraser's attention, where he stood halfway frozen, staring down at the bare join of chests, his hands still on the undone halves of his zipper. "I've got you."

From there, it's all kisses and stumbling out of the bathroom - wet jeans left in an unceremonious pile on the throw that kept your feet from freezing on the waxed wood floors in the morning. Bodies touching together in a way that was familiar and electric and still new, but reassuring. Ray's pretty sure it's not the fever at this point that has the lowest part of his back slicking up with sweat - not the cold that's causing his breath to stutter and skip rapidly in it's beat.

Then he finds Benny's mouth after everything else is out of the way, and time seems to freeze. Stella didn't matter. The malaria lake didn't matter. Benny's Chicken and Moose Stew didn't matter - here they were, they had each other. That mattered. Mouth on mouth, it was hot. Breaths shared when they pulled apart to pant, and his mind made a brief plea for real, oxygen rich air so he turned his head down to pull cold air into his lungs and focus on his hands - Ray found them doing something utterly artless, clinging to Fraser's sides, fingers splayed hard against his ribs.

He pushes them lower - and here's another great thing about Benny. Every part of him is hard and perfect and muscled. He didn't bulge, but he'd bounce a quarter. It was a joy to explore, and every time he touched Benny, it seemed like he couldn't get enough. Tracing his fingers over Fraser, he feels worry start to creep into the mountie. Ray had been sick earlier - but now he really didn't care to be coddled - there were other interests on his mind.

"Ray." Benny starts to protest. Ray, sensing the coming tirade of reasons why they shouldn't do this, didn't stop. He gave Benny a little shove, and followed him over onto his side, his mouth seeking neck - chest - stomach in a pointed line. His fingers find Benny's erection first, coaxing, while Benny tries to maintain composure enough to protest.

"Ray. Ray." Persistance gave way to silence for a long moment when Ray took him in his mouth. They both let go, again. Benny couldn't resist his own pleasure, and Ray never wanted to even try - it was sweeter this way. Though still hot - rushed - exciting. Benny's hands sank into Ray's hair, pulled. Ray let him, sped his pace. There wasn't rhythm - no time for it, rushed and pulling, grasping until finally Benny managed to make a sudden enough movement with Ray's short hair that he pulled back.

Mouths met again, desperate and wet, parting and rejoining around breaths. Benny's hands went down between them while Ray's held tight to his shoulders. Heat surrounded both of them, moving together - without synch, nor did they need it or it mattered. They rushed, tumbled, arched to completion, spending together. Temple pressed to temple they waited, let the world slowly float back into place around them.

Afterwards, Ray felt remarkably clear headed. Forehead to forehead, he didn't feel much warmer than Fraser did - though both were pretty warm from the exertion. "Listen." Ray started, stopped. "Benny. Don't worry." Ray hoped it conveyed, in a sort of masculine way, that he wasn't going anywhere - that being without Stella sure as hell wasn't the end of the world. That Benny was better at taking care of him when he was sick, moose soup and all. Fraser's eyes came open, met his across a tiny span - so green up close, and impossible not to look at.

"I'm not." Fraser said, with that utmost absolute confidence that he always had about everything. That was it. That was all it had to be.


End file.
